Morning journal and courier., 1887-01-17
WOMAN AND HOME.
Tact and Goodness Required to Manage
Household.

Household.
From Harper's Bazar.
The affairs of the household are seldom
very simple affairs; as much tact and cool
ness as it needs to manage great business,
with books and clerks and customers, is
often required to keep the systematic work
ing of things in the family, and accommo-
date that to all the Interruptions and inter
ferences that daily life is sure to bring; to
keep the differing tempers of the persons
composing the household in any degree har-
monious; to stand between master and cook
and remain uncrushed, between cook and
housemaid and retain both in service; to
have sickness in the house and a nurse and
retain anybody; to do ones own work and
be ready with smiles and cheer and decent
front on occasion for company.
The unpreiudiced observer might well ask
what manner of woman is it that man has
married, when he has SO poor opinion of
her that he does not believe she would feel
his interests as keenly as he himself feels
them, does not perceive that their interests
are mutual and that they are working to the
same end; does not want to save a dollar
for the common good as much he does,
and is not willing to work hard and go
without as much in her own way. The un-
prejudieed observer might also ask if the
husband, who is SO close with his purse, con-
sidering it his and not the family purse, is
actuated by no meaner motive than distrust;
if his own outside and purely selfish pleas
ures would not be interfered with in the ab-
straction of funds if the wife were allowed
to spend as she pleased. She has cigars
to buy, no drinks to take, billi rds to
play, no expenses beyond those of her own
and the children's apparel, according to her
idea of propriety; and what is really trihe
in the way of his own expenditure is vast
sum of money to her.
Women do not expect a great deal, speak
ing of them in the mass, and not of the scat
| tered few who are the children of luxury.
We have known 81 wife to burst into tears of
joy at being given $25 to prepare her family
of four with clothing for the summer, going
without anything new herself; we have
known one to take the money given her by
a brother for needed article of clothing,
and to buy with it barrel of -four rather
than tell her husband the flour had come. to
an end; and we have known another to cut
| up every gown but that she had in order
to keep her girls fit for school, while the hus
| baud appeared to know nothing of what was
| going on, and she sat in the chimney corner
never going out by day, growing old before
| her time, knowing and seeing almost moth
| ing of the world through the want of de-
cent apparel. And if these are isolated in
| stances of their kind it is only because most
| husbands are not really mean, although they
may have to be asked fur what is wanted, and
then may give it as gift, considering them
selves generous, while the wives feel that
they have right to the necessaries of life, if
no more, and that it should be theirs without
asking.
But in the most frequent cases there is no
expressed community of interest," no saying
or imp tying that there is just SO much avail
able income, and how can it best be used;
but in the majority of instances, if the wife
wants an article of any sort to wear, she has
to appeal to him, giving him statement of
her wishes and reasons, and convincing him
of the necessity of it; she has to do the same
if it is only pair of new boots; and at the
thought of new bonnet she has to dread
hearing ho,nily female vanity and the
idleness of fashions, while she would be sur
prsed at herself if she had a 80 cent piece in
her pocket with which to answer a call Of
charity or buy spool of silk. Nothing
could have been devised to make her more
surely feel her inferiority or to teach it. to
the children, who see money doled out to her
as it is dcied out to them. If, under such
circumstances, the wife supplies herself with
small change in a surreptitious way, flching
from his pockets dime a nickel at
time till she can at any rate, take "a ride in
the street Car without asking, and if by
means of that it happens that his children
are the children of thief and perhaps
born kleptomaniacs he has himself to thank
for the baseness that has been achieved
himself and his habit of making the hand
ling of money the criterion of sense and
authority.